Talk:High Windows (poem)

Comment, following my reversion of 24/5/08
I've tried only to write down only broad generalities on poem structure (which seem largely self-documenting) since more is either OR or needs references (which often aren't given). (And it's likely isn't it that at least some of Larkin's apparent sexual envy is a bit of a smokescreen!) Linuxlad (talk) 22:53, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Material by John Butterfield, reverted from main text 13/2/2009
Philip Larkin was described as 'the best Poet Laureate we never had’ and was regarded as a poet of place. In his writing he mixes his familiarity of people with his own personal isolation whilst drawing on the pessimistic side of human emotion to maximum effect. ‘High Windows’ is a charged and thought provoking short poem that makes full use of the available space on the page. With the clever use of shape and punctuation, it manages to stir and then lift the reader’s curiosity whilst employing a writing style that is linguistically very simple, yet contains complex ideas. Written in free verse, he moves the reader on a journey by using a divisive semantic field paired with an ambiguous lexical range. The reader’s initial thoughts may be one of ease as the size and shape of this poem is one of simplicity, just twenty-five lines shared into five equal stanzas, but this apparent simplicity soon fades after the opening verse. There is an early and unsettling tone within ‘High Windows’ portraying the thoughts of an angry but pitiful old man spitting his unnecessary and cantankerous opinion. A retrospective mood swings in towards the middle, whilst it finishes with a feel of gentle contemplation and acceptance. The first stanza sets the mood and is written in a colloquial, literal style using a simple word choice ‘When I see a couple of kids / And guess he’s fucking her and she’s / Taking pills or wearing a diaphragm,’ the writer draws immediate interest with profanity and a gritty simplicity. With enjambment, the first use of punctuation does not appear until the end of the third line, this gives the effect of speed with a tidy conversational quality. This first stanza slows down and finishes in an apostrophic manner, like a whisper ‘I know this is paradise’. But what is paradise, watching the ‘kids’ or his present physical and/or conscious state? The lack of punctuation at the end of this final verse leaves an open space, a loose shape with no fixed boundary. This can be seen as an open timeframe where the reader is given time to absorb the words on the page. The second stanza exposes a nostalgic vision of life and a cruel view of ageing ‘Everyone old has dreamed of all their lives-’. The dash changes the outline of this stanza and draws the eye to the end of the page where once again, the reader is given more time to take in the verse. This line also displays an unusual syntax. With the stress on ‘all’ this forces the idea of whose life has been dreamt? It continues ‘Bonds and gestures pushed to one side’ the bonds and gestures could be interpreted as severed relationships and broken promises, ‘Like an outdated combine harvester’. Larkin chooses to use the word ‘outdated’ rather than ‘old’, which gives a greater impression of age and isolation, whilst the simile of the speaker to the ‘combine harvester’ shows that he once held huge presence and always felt useful but now feels worthless, a broken and outdated machine. The final line to this second stanza compares life to a symbolic slide, a Shakespearian mortal coil, ‘and everyone young going down the long slide’ the reader is now directed towards an introspective look at our own mortality. Enjambment again follows at the end of the second stanza, used to reinforce the beginning of the third ‘To happiness, endlessly. I wonder if / anyone looked at me, forty years back,’ Our thoughts are now changed from mortality to ‘happiness’ the caesura, on this line, emphasises this endless happiness with the full-stop. We now get a tangible idea of the age of the subject ‘forty years back’ and how he believes others perceived him when he was a ‘kid’, whether the elders thought of him as he thinks of the couple he is now observing. It continues ‘And thought, That’ll be the life; / No God any more, or sweating in the dark’. This gives youth a carefree attitude, no religion to dwell on the conscience, no toiling towards a crumbling ideal, no worrying about all the things that accompany ageing. This is also a paradox, written in a future tense, suggesting a point where the old themselves become young again. ‘Sweating in the dark’ continues into the penultimate stanza ‘About hell and that, or having to hide / What you think of the priest.’ The use of italics changes the shape of this section of the poem and exposes a deep, retrospective thought process. Standing apart from the conventional text, it gives this section intensity as if spoken in anger or through gritted teeth. The use of colloquial diction once again gives the work a coarse, working class tone whilst further exposes the underlying theme of the writer’s self-inflicted, religious guilt. ‘He / And his lot will all go down the long slide / like bloody free birds.’ The priests will take the long slide to happiness with significant ease, like free birds. This is use of antithesis, birds would never slide down, they would only ever take flight. Is this seen as an even shorter and easier route to happiness and the speaker is angry that the sanctimonious priest will always beat the layman to heaven. At this point caesura, in the form of a full stop, slows the pace of the poem down to a grinding halt. ‘And immediately’ we move to the final stanza. The shape and the size of this final stanza is different from anything else seen so far in the poem, using a varied range of punctuation gives the stanza a pulsed, staccato effect. It gently massages the reader into taking a deep breath and settling into the peaceful language of the poems climax. This stanza comes as a shock and is purposely juxtaposed against the tone of the rest of the poem. From the profane, gritty, colloquial use of language, we now find a semantic field of gentle deliberation which continues ‘And immediately / Rather than the words comes the thought of high windows: / The sun-comprehending glass,’ which gives the impression of great comfort and tranquillity, a warm breeze with autumnal sun. There is nothing more to say, enough has been said, just the warm sun and the high windows. ‘High Windows’ could be a metaphor for internment, prisons have high windows and although the subject may be bitter and show flashes of deep anger; it would not make sense for him to be a prisoner. The final two lines bring this poem to its contemplative conclusion ‘And beyond it, the deep blue air, that shows / Nothing, and is nowhere, and is endless.’ this produces a warm feeling and an unconscious sentiment that everything is fine. Reference to the ‘deep blue air’, gives the reader a three-dimensional sky whilst remaining ‘nowhere’ and ‘endless’ it will always have different connotation to different readers. The speaker could be at great peace with himself as this entire last stanza could be a metaphor for death, it could be heaven and the high windows may be apostle-painted church windows, The shape and space of this poem is as stimulating as the content and is written with great ambiguity. There is nothing to suggest the gender of the subject or the time or location as if the entire piece is ‘nothing, and nowhere and is endless’. With his punctuation and use of italics, it is clear that Larkin has considered shape when writing ‘High Windows'.

I hope you have enjoyed reading my analysis of High Windows.--Johnbutterfield (talk) 21:46, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
 * yes it's good, but it's OR! sorry Bob aka Linuxlad (talk) 18:25, 13 February 2009 (UTC)